British D-Day veteran aged 100 dies before he can honour fallen comrades one more time

army veteran Bill Gladden, who survived a glider landing on D-Day and a bullet that tore through his ankle a few days later, wanted to return to France for the 80th anniversary of the invasion so he could honour the men who didn't come home.Gladden, one of the dwindling number of veterans who took part in the landings that kicked off the campaign to liberate Western Europe from the Nazis during World War II, died Wednesday, his family said. He was 100.

Born January 13, 1924, Gladden was raised in the Woolwich area of southeast London. His mother worked at the nearby Royal Arsenal during World War I and his father was a soldier.He joined the army at 18 and was ultimately assigned to the 6th Airborne Reconnaissance Regiment as a motorcycle dispatch rider.

On June 16, he carried two wounded soldiers into a barn that was being used as a makeshift field hospital. Two days later, he found himself at the same hospital after machine gun fire from a German tank shattered his right ankle.Bill Gladden joined the army at 18 and was ultimately assigned to the 6th Airborne Reconnaissance Regiment as a motorcycle dispatch rider. "Amputation considered. Large deep wound in right ankle. Compound fracture of both tibia and fibula.

Over the years, Gladden had regularly joined other old soldiers on trips to battlefields in Normandy and the Netherlands organised by the Taxi Charity for Military veterans. Though he was happier talking about his family than reminiscing about the war, Gladden chronicled his wartime story in a scrapbook that includes a newspaper clipping about "the tanks that were built to fly," drawings of the glider landings and other memorabilia.

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